The wind whined in the chimney and somewhere a shutter banged
spitefully.
“That’s the only touch we needed to make a perfect evening!” said
Grace, her cheeks glowing. “I expect to hear a stage coach come tearing
into the yard any minute pursued by highwaymen. How did you ever come
to think of McGovern’s?”
“Just one of my little happy thoughts! Now that we’ve found the way
there’s no reason why we can’t repeat,” said Cummings.
“There you go! This doesn’t establish a precedent; it belongs to those
experiences it’s better never to try again. But, it’s certainly jolly
so far as we’ve gone. What if somebody should come prancing in?”
“It’s not a good night for prancing. McGovern said there hadn’t been a
soul here for a week. That’s why he let us come, I suppose.”
“I can think of certain persons who wouldn’t add much to the joy of
this particular party,” said Grace musingly.
“A little danger adds to the fun! You seem to forget that I thought it
all up; I’m ready to go right on round the world!”
“Yes, you are!” she retorted teasingly. “It sounds awful but sometimes
I think it’s cowardice that keeps most of us good! If you were a
philosopher I’d ask your opinion on that subject but I see you haven’t
a ghost of an idea!”
He frowned. There had always been a serious side to Grace. In her high
school days she was constantly dipping into books that were beyond her,
treatises on social science and the like that only depressed him. He
didn’t know, of course, how eagerly she had caught at the opportunity
of spending the evening with him merely to enjoy a few hours freedom
from the turmoil of her own soul. It interested her for a moment to
sound him as to whether by any chance he was conscious of the general
transformation of things or knew that their visit to McGovern’s in
itself had a significance; but he was a dreamer who responded only to
the harmonies of life and avoided all its discords. He was caught up
in the whirligig of apparently changing conditions just as she knew
herself to be. Were they really breaking down the old barriers? Or was
the world, aided by gasoline and jazz, moving so rapidly that in the
mad rush it required a more alert eye to discern the danger signs?
The fact that she was eating supper with another woman’s husband in
a place frankly chosen for its isolation interested her, as so many
social phenomena had interested her since she left the University.
“Oh, thunder!” he said with a shrug. “There’s no use in our worrying.
Let the old folks do that. I guess we’ve all got a right to be happy
and tastes differ as to what happiness is. That’s all.”
This, of course, wasn’t all, but she refrained from saying so. A look
came into his eyes that warned her to have a care. She must guard
herself from an attempt on his part, which she saw was impending, to
take advantage of the hour to make love to her.
“Grace,” he resumed, “every time I get blue it’s you I want to see.”
“Tush, tush! I’d never have come if I’d thought you were going to be
foolish. Don’t you get the notion into your silly head that you can run
to me every time you get down in the mouth. There’s no reason why I
should hold your hand when you’re sorrowful; I don’t want the job!”
She was eating with an honest appetite that discouraged his hope of
interesting her in sentiment.
“Wow! I thought you’d jump at the offer!”
“Have another biscuit! I want to laugh! How silly this is, Bob! I
supposed you brought me out here to show me a good time and we’re
almost at the point of quarreling.”
“Now, Grace, we’ll never do that! I didn’t think you’d mind the
compliment! But,” dolefully, “I suppose you get so many!”
He became tractable, obedient, anxious to please her. She knew that
she could do with him very much as she pleased; but there was no
satisfaction in the exercise of her power over so unstable a character.
She was sorry for him, much as she would have been sorry for a child
who never quite learned his lessons; and there were lessons Bob
Cummings would never learn.
After they had eaten their dessert they started the victrola and
danced, and Bob was again the good play-fellow. They began burlesquing
classic dances, and laughed so boisterously at their success in making
themselves ridiculous that McGovern and his wife came in to watch them.
They had brought themselves to a high pitch of merriment when McGovern,
who was assisting his wife in clearing the table, darted across the
room and stopped the music.
“Good Lord; it’s some one knocking!” cried Bob, as the outer door shook
under a heavy thumping.
“Just keep quiet,” said McGovern. “I guess it’s some one who’s got into
trouble on the road.”
“People stop for a little gas to help ’em out sometimes,” said Mrs.
McGovern. “Mac’ll get rid of ’em.”
McGovern, with his shoulder against the door threw a look of inquiry
at Cummings and Grace. Cummings lifted his head as the voice again
demanded admittance.
“Sounds like Atwood,--a chap I know,” he said to Grace. “Who’s with
him, Mac?”
As McGovern opened the door a few grudging inches a male voice called
him by name.
“Let us in, Mac: we’re freezing to death!”
“Sorry, but we’re closed for the season,” McGovern answered.
“That doesn’t go, Mac! You can’t turn _me_ down,” replied the voice.
Before McGovern could answer a vigorous pressure flung the door open
and a young man stepped in followed by a young woman in a fur coat and
smart toque.
“Never thought you’d shut the door in my face, Mac!” said the young man
reproachfully. “We’ve got to have some coffee and sandwiches. Hello,
Mrs. Mac: how’s everything?”
The young woman, blinking in the light, was walking toward the
fireplace when she became aware that McGovern and his wife had been
entertaining other guests. She paused and stared, her gaze passing
slowly from Cummings to Grace. Her companion, finding that McGovern and
his wife were receiving coldly his voluble expressions of regard, now
first caught sight of the two figures across the room.
“Hello-o-o!” he exclaimed. “Look who’s here!”
“Why, Jimmie, is that you?” said Cummings with a gulp.
“I call it some night! And Mac, the old pirate, didn’t want to let me
in!”
The McGoverns were hastily retiring toward the kitchen, Mac tiptoeing
as though leaving a death chamber. The weight of his grievous error was
upon him; never before had he precipitated a wife upon a husband in so
disturbing a fashion.
Grace was watching the young woman, who pulled a chair away from the
table that still bore evidences of the recent repast and sank into
it. She was tall and slender and the light struck gold in her hair.
Feeling perhaps that Grace’s eyes were upon her, she bent and plucked a
raveling, real or imaginary, from the skirt of her coat. She unbottoned
her coat and drew off her gloves with elaborate care.
Her companion stood with his hands thrust into the pockets of his
overcoat, grinning. An old-fashioned clock on the mantel began to
strike to the accompaniment of queer raspings of its mechanism. The
hands indicated the hour as ten but in the manner of its kind the
hammer within pounded out twelve. There was a suggestion of insolence
in the protracted thumping of the bell. As the last torturing sound
was dying Grace turned her head slightly to look at Cummings, who was
staring blankly at the lady in the fur coat.
“What a funny clock!” Atwood remarked with the jubilant tone of one who
has made a discovery of great value to mankind.
“It’s a dreadful liar!” said Grace.
“My grandfather used to have one just like it, with a basket of fruit
painted on the door,” said Atwood, advancing toward Grace, beaming with
gratitude for her response to his attempt to promote conversation. He
was short, plump and blond, with thin fair hair already menaced by
baldness. He was not far advanced in the twenties and looked very much
like an overgrown school boy. Grace appraised him as a person of kindly
impulses and possibly not wholly without common sense.
Having planted himself beside Grace he remarked further upon clocks
and their general unreliability, while he rolled his eyes first toward
Cummings and then in the direction of the lady in the fur coat. Grace
had already assumed without the aid of this telegraphy that the lady
was Bob’s wife. Atwood seemed to be appealing to Grace to assist him
in terminating a situation that was verging upon the intolerable,
but she was unable to see that it was incumbent upon her to take the
initiative. But Mrs. Cummings might sit there forever unless something
happened. Bob continued to wear the look of one condemned and awaiting
the pleasure of the executioner. Grace felt strongly moved to walk
up to him and shake him. She had read of such unfortunate meetings
between husband and wife and they were usually attended with furious
denunciations and sometimes with pistols. Without the sustaining
presence of Atwood she would have retired to the domestic end of the
McGovern establishment and waited for the storm to blow over, but the
storm, if such impended, was slow in developing.
“This can’t last forever,” said Grace in a low tone.
“If _something_ doesn’t happen in a minute I’m a dead man,” Atwood
whispered.
“I think it would be nice if we all got acquainted. I’m Miss Durland,
Mr. Atwood,” said Grace in a tone audible throughout the room.
“Thank you so much! I was just dying to know your name!” he declared
fervidly. “Oh, Evelyn----”
Evelyn lifted her head and looked at him defiantly, but he squared
himself and said:
“Mrs. Cummings, Miss Durland. I really supposed you had met before.”
His voice rose to an absurd squeak as he expressed this last hopeful
sentiment.
Evelyn bit her lip and nodded, a nod that might have been intended for
Grace or quite as definitely for an enlarged photograph of an ancestral
whiskered McGovern in a gilt frame that adorned the wall behind her.
Grace glanced at Bob, still rooted to the floor, and he remarked with
badly-feigned cheerfulness.
“Well, I suppose we might as well go home--” a suggestion not without
ambiguity, as there were four persons in the room and two at least,
having just arrived and awaiting refreshments, might be assumed to
prefer to linger.
“Not just yet!” said Grace, walking slowly toward Evelyn. “There’s
something I’d like to say to Mrs. Cummings.”
“Oh, _really_----”
“We’re going in a minute,” interposed Cummings, with sudden animation.
“I think maybe, Grace----”
“Grace!” Evelyn repeated scornfully. “I’m going home. Jimmy, I want you
to take me home.”
“Yes, Evelyn; of course we’ll go whenever you like,” said Atwood. “But,
we ought to explain things a little. I mean you and I ought to explain
them,” he elaborated as he saw her lips tighten. “I wouldn’t want Bob
to think----”
“I don’t care what Bob thinks!” she flared. “He lied to me; he told me
he had a business engagement, to get out of taking me to Uncle Fred’s!
And this was the engagement!”
“But everything’s going to be explained,” Atwood persisted. “You know
there’s always an explanation for everything, and Bob’s the best fellow
in the world--you know that Evelyn.”
“I know nothing of the kind! I’ll let him know at the proper time and
place what I think of him.”
“Well, of course, Evelyn,” said Atwood with his odd little pipe of a
laugh. But he was very earnest; he brought Cummings to his side by
an imperious gesture. As the man for the hour he was not acquitting
himself so badly; he looked at Grace for her approval, wasn’t sure that
she gave it, but with his hand resting on Cummings’s shoulder, he spoke
directly to the point.
“I’m awfully sorry about this, Bob. You know I’m in and out of your
house a lot and you never seem to mind. And tonight I tried to get you
on the telephone to see if we could do something, the three of us I
mean,--run down to see a picture or any old thing--and the maid said
you were at Colonel Felton’s; both of you, I thought she meant. And I
called up there about the time I thought the party would be over and
found you weren’t there and asked Evelyn to let me come for her. And I
thought it would be good fun to take a little dash through the storm
and I knew you wouldn’t care. There couldn’t be any harm in that; we’ve
all been out here together lots of times.”
“Why, that’s perfectly all right, Jimmie!” exclaimed Cummings with a
flourish of magnanimity which did not, however, awaken the grateful
response he may have expected from Evelyn, who had murmured an
indifferent, “Thank you, Jimmie,” when Atwood concluded.
“There’s nothing tragic about this,” Cummings began a little defiantly.
“Miss Durland and I have known each other all our lives. She’s an old
friend. She came out with me just as a lark; just as you and Jimmie
came. I don’t want you to think----”
“That will do!” said Evelyn rising so suddenly that Cummings backed
away from her in alarm. “Anything you have to say to me needn’t be said
before this old friend of yours.”
“But, Evelyn, you’re not fair!” cried Cummings hotly. “It isn’t fair to
Miss Durland. The whole fault of her being out here is mine. I’ll not
have you think----”
“You’re terribly anxious about what I think!” Evelyn interrupted. “I’ll
think what I please!”
Grace, on her way to the sofa on which she had left her coat and hat,
swung round, her face aflame.
“It may not occur to you, Mrs. Cummings, that what you think isn’t of
the slightest importance.”
“You act as though you thought it was!” Evelyn flung back.
“I’m not acting; you’re doing enough of it!”
“You’ve probably had far more experience in such scenes!”
“With much better actors than your husband, I hope!”
“Humph! I don’t believe we’re going to like each other.”
“The regret is not mine, I assure you!”
Grace turned to a mirror to straighten her hat. Her preparations for
departure were provocative of thought in Atwood’s mind. He expressed
the thought immediately, evidently with the laudable hope of lessening
the tension.
“Oh, Miss Durland, won’t you let _me_ take you home? I can run you into
town without the slightest trouble.”
Evelyn’s surprise at this suggestion betrayed itself in a spurt of
coffee that missed the cup she was filling and spread in an amber stain
on the table cloth.
Grace was walking toward the veranda door drawing on her gloves.
“Thank you ever so much, Mr. Atwood,” she said evenly. “But Mr.
Cummings is going to take me home!”
Cummings glanced at his wife, uncertainty plainly written on his face.
“Why, yes--yes--” he mumbled.
“I’m waiting, Bob!” said Grace.
He gathered up his raincoat and cap. Grace waited for him to open the
door for her.
“Good-night, Mr. Atwood!” she flung over her shoulder, and the door
closed.
“Well, there was that!” Cummings said after they were in the highway.
“I hope you’re satisfied with yourself,” said Grace angrily.
“Good Lord! Didn’t I do the best I could about it?”
“You couldn’t have done worse if you’d had a week to plan it! Instead
of standing there like a fool when your wife came in, why didn’t you
walk right up to her like a man and introduce me? You were scared to
death; you thought of nothing but how you were going to square yourself
with her. You did everything you could to give her the idea that you
were ashamed of me.”
“Why, Grace, you can’t mean this!” He slowed down the car the better
to talk. “God knows I did the best I could. I couldn’t help being
surprised when they came in. And you never can tell how Evelyn’s going
to take anything.”
“Oh, yes; it was Evelyn you were troubled about; you weren’t at all
worried about me! When you came out of your trance and tried to explain
how I came to be there the mischief was already done. Of course she
wouldn’t listen to you then. You certainly made a mess of it.”
“I don’t understand you at all! I swear I did the best I could.”
“Well, it was a pretty poor best! Please mind what you’re doing; you’re
still so nervous you’ll land in the ditch in a minute.”
Thus admonished he steadied himself at the wheel. Her anger had
expended itself and she was now silently staring ahead at the snow
covered road.
No word had passed between them for several minutes and Grace, absorbed
in her own thoughts, was hoping that he wouldn’t attempt to discuss
the matter further. Her respect for him was gone; she disliked him
cordially, seeing him only as a timid, evasive person whose primary
impulse was self-protection. He might play on the wrong side of a
forbidden wall but the moment he was discovered he would scramble for
safe territory.
He touched her hand so suddenly that she started and snatched it away
with a feeling of aversion.
“We’ve both been thinking about what happened back there,” he began. “I
don’t know just where it leaves me; I don’t know how Evelyn is going to
take it.”
He paused, bending forward while he waited for some encouragement to go
on.
“I don’t care how Evelyn is going to take it! I thought I’d made it
clear that I didn’t want to talk of your private affairs any more. They
don’t interest me in the least.”
“Of course if Evelyn wants a row----”
“Oh, Bob! _Please_, be quiet!”
“But I can’t leave it this way! You’ve meant too much to me for us to
part like this. What I was going to say was--is----”
She sighed despairingly and resettled herself in her place.
“What I want you to know is that I care a lot for you, Grace--and if
there’s a row--if we break up, Evelyn and I, I mean----”
“I think you’ve lost your mind!” she cried furiously.
“But, you don’t see--you don’t understand----”
“Oh, but I do! If Evelyn turns you out you think maybe you’d like
to give _me_ a trial! That’s certainly an idea! I suppose you have
visions of me figuring in your divorce suit--Cummings against Cummings!
I don’t believe you used to be like this. It’s astonishing how you’ve
deteriorated!”
“I didn’t expect this from you, Grace!” he replied bitterly. “I’ve felt
that I could always count on you to----”
The engine began to cough peevishly and he stopped to investigate.
“Here’s luck!” he exclaimed spitefully as he got back into the car.
“Just about enough gas to pull us to that garage half a mile ahead. I
guess somebody’s pinned a jinx on the evening!”
“I’ll wait outside,” she said when the car had been coaxed to the
garage.
“Only a minute, Grace. I’m awfully sorry.”
As she stood on the cement driveway the whistle followed by a flash
of the headlight of an incoming interurban car on the track that ran
parallel with the highway caught her attention. Across the road several
people were waiting on the platform and she resolved to board the car
if it stopped before Cummings reappeared. She was in a humor to annoy
him if she could and as the car slowed down she began to walk slowly
toward the platform and then with a glance over her shoulder ran and
swung herself aboard. As the car got under way she caught a glimpse of
the roadster as Cummings backed it out. She derived no small degree of
satisfaction from the reflection that her departure in this fashion
expressed her scorn of him more effectually than anything she could
have said.
She left the car at the interurban station and walked home. Her
knowledge of life was broadening and that too in divisions of the
Great Curriculum of whose very existence she had had only the haziest
consciousness. Her freedom, the independence she so greatly prized,
was not without its perils. Her thoughts took a high range; she
wondered whether after all the individual could, without incurring
serious hazards, ignore the warnings and safeguards established for the
protection of society.
She wanted to laugh over the encounter at McGovern’s, but in the quiet
street it was not so easy to laugh at it. What society had done to
educate her, to fortify and strengthen her for the battle of life--a
phrase she detested from her mother’s frequent use of it--counted for
naught. She was alarmed to find that she never really reached any
conclusion in attempting to settle her problems. When she thought she
had determined any of the matters that rose with so malevolent an
insistence for decision some unexpected turn left her still beset by
uncertainties.
Two policemen standing on a corner stopped talking as she passed and
she felt their eyes following her. They symbolized the power of the
law; they were agents of society, they were representatives of the
order of things against which she had been trying to persuade herself
she was in rebellion. She now seriously questioned the desirability of
being a rebel; such a status had its disagreeable and uncomfortable
side.
When she reached her room she sat down thinking she would write her
usual daily letter to Trenton; but with paper before her and a pen in
her hand she was unable to bring herself to it. The disturbance at
McGovern’s had shaken her more than she liked to believe.
In her cogitations, as she lay in the dark unable to sleep, she
wondered whether the incident at McGovern’s might not be a warning,
which she would do well to heed, to discourage Trenton’s further
attentions. Trenton might in a similar circumstances behave no better
than Bob had behaved and she was not anxious to subject herself to the
ire of another indignant wife.